Events

Dr. Marvin Hanisch
Assistant professor
Innovation Management & Strategy Department
University of Groningen

ABSTRACT

Blockchain technology presents a potential solution for governing complex organizational networks through partial automation. A critical decision for founders of enterprise blockchains relates to whether the algorithmic governance layer native to the blockchain should be supplemented by costly administrative controls that can facilitate coordination and reduce opportunistic risks. We hypothesize that founders of enterprise blockchains will evaluate this tradeoff in favor of adopting administrative controls as the number and variety of founders and the rivalry and interdependency among founders increase. We test our theory on a unique sample of 128 blockchain initiatives and find that different administrative controls are employed by blockchain founders in response to different costs of coordination and opportunism. We complement our primary analysis with a study of the configurations of governance conditions that lead to blockchain discontinuation. Our study advances theories on network governance and contributes to the emerging literature on blockchains.